Core A: Human Tissue Acquisition and Cell Culture Laboratory INTRODUCTION. The availability of human tissues is a necessity for the conduct of experiments within each of the projects, and the investigators collectively have many years of experience with experimentation involving human tissue samples. The Program Project has for more than 20 years maintained an excellent working relationship with the Department of Pathology at our teaching hospital and with the staffs of the obstetric and gynecological services in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology. The current arrangement was built on that historical base and modified as needed to accommodate specific needs of the projects and to keep abreast of compliance issues related to use and procurement of human tissues. Working with components of the Administrative Core, this centralized process for collection, processing, and culturing of human tissues and cells has proven to be e'<peditious and cost-effective. In addition, it provides a consistency in acquisition and processing and a standardization of tissue preparation and cell culturing that is extremely beneficial to the investigative process. A repository of frozen tissue samples is also maintained within this Core laboratory. The stored samples include myometrium, endometrium, cervix, placenta, amnion, decidua, and cord blood plasma collected over the last several years;also stored are samples of selected fetal tissues (12-20 weeks gestational age) collected during a previous program under an approved protocol for obtaining tissues from elective abortions. A database is maintained of the stored tissues, their locations, and relevant collection and medical information. In addition to obtaining tissues for use by Program Project investigators, the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology is now able to fund partial salary support for research personnel so that this tissue acquisition program is available to other investigators in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology as well as other departments on campus, provided they have IRB-approved protocols.